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Topic: “there’s no(one) … as ” (Read 1461 times)

am wondering what you think about that and how would you translate this sentence. Been looking at a song that I’d like to translate and I’m wondering about this stylistic device which is to negate part of a superlative construct. The sentence is in essence:

“There is not a lovelier young woman in the world than the pretty girl.”

It’s about the “there’s no …” or “nobody is ADJ-er than X” I’m pondering about.

This has to do with style more than with grammar, I think, because I’m well aware that this basically says, “the pretty girl is the loveliest young woman in the world,” which we can say

The only problem I see here is that there are two adjective connected to tuté. So what is correct meaning:- there's no younger beautiful woman in the world than this pretty girl, or- there's no more beautiful young woman in the world than this pretty girl, or- there's no younger and more beautiful woman in the world than this pretty girl ?

The only problem I see here is that there are two adjective connected to tuté. So what is correct meaning:- there's no younger beautiful woman in the world than this pretty girl, or- there's no more beautiful young woman in the world than this pretty girl, or- there's no younger and more beautiful woman in the world than this pretty girl ?

With single adjective there's no problem, but with two....

The to-construct demands a word of comparison, does it not? Where is that with two adjectives attached to the noun?

Then in this case the attributive structure must be broken to specify the adjective one is refering to…

Ke lu kea ’ewana tuté a mì hifkey to fì’evenge asevin lu lor.There is not a lovelier {young woman} than this petty girl.

Ke lu kea lora tuté a mì hifkey to fì’evenge asevin lu ’ewan.There is not a younger {lovely woman} than this pretty girl.

Regardless of grammatical correctmess, Blue Elf's sentence is easier to understand (despite the possible confusion caused by the back-to back adjectives), at least to this hopelessly English-contaminated mind. The confusing thing on Plump's sentences is the adjective hanging all the way at the end of the sentence, even if on analysis the main verb in the sentence is the lu immediately before it. At the moment, I am at a loss for suggestions not already suggested, on how to fix this.

The only drawback I see is the ability to attach only one adjective from left (’ewana).

Why do you think that there is only one attributive adjective allowed? Because of the subordinate clause? I think there are enough examples in the canon where something like eana txìm atsawl a palukanìl frolìp is correct

Again, it might be my stolid English mindset, but both Tanri's and Blue Elf's attempts at capturing the meaning here seem to make good sense. The examples by Plumps, while grammatically correct, do not capture the meaning like the other examples. The fact that much of what is going on in the entire sentence happens in the last two words, may be the reason why. I have read both of these sentences over and over, and they just never become clear.

In the end, I think most ideas can be presented a number of different, equally valid ways. But some just work out better than others. And maybe there are people reading this who are experiencing just the opposite-- Plump's sentences make the most sense, and Tanri/Blue Elf less so. If you are one of these folks, your input here would be most interesting.

How simple! Karma for you, applause for you! To be honest, I have hard time to understand both sentences from Plumps - two lu's give me no sense....

One lu takes the place that Tanri’s version achieves with fkeytok … no real difference there

If we add one "a", I can agree.Ke lu kea ’ewana tuté a mì hifkey to sevina fì’evenge a lu lor.Wthout that "a" it does'nt appear correct to me.BTW lu X tok is neverending battle, IMHO some guidelines from Paul would be useful

The only drawback I see is the ability to attach only one adjective from left (’ewana).

Why do you think that there is only one attributive adjective allowed? Because of the subordinate clause? I think there are enough examples in the canon where something like eana txìm atsawla palukanìl frolìp is correct

Two "adjectives" from the same side are allowed? Unbelievable! IMHO correct way how to say this would be:

txìm a lu ean sì tsawl ulte palukanìl frolìp tsat (meh, weird, anyway). Can you give me exact link into canon? I'd like to see it by my own eyes.

In English we sometimes hear things like, “She’s a beautiful, beautiful woman” as a way of saying “She’s an extremely beautiful woman.” Something similar occurs in Na’vi, where the structure is more common than in English:

Lu po lora tuté alor. ‘She’s an extremely beautiful woman.’

In speech, the second occurrence of the adjective is stressed more than the first: lora tuté ALOR.In the above example, we’re using this double-adjective structure in a noun phrase: lora tuté alor, ‘an extremely beautiful woman.’ Can we also use it for sentences like, “That woman is extremely beautiful”? Yes, but it’s awkward:

Tsatuté lu lora pum alor. ‘That woman is an extremely beautiful one.’

That’s not a problem, however, since we already have a number of ways to intensify a predicate adjective: lor nìtxan, lor nìtxan nang, lor nì’aw, etc. So using the double-adjective structure for sentences like this last example isn’t necessary.

Why do you think that there is only one attributive adjective allowed? Because of the subordinate clause? I think there are enough examples in the canon where something like eana txìm atsawla palukanìl frolìp is correct

Two "adjectives" from the same side are allowed? Unbelievable!

Can you give me exact link into canon? I'd like to see it by my own eyes.

If we add one "a", I can agree.Ke lu kea ’ewana tuté a mì hifkey to sevina fì’evenge a lu lor.Wthout that "a" it does'nt appear correct to me.

But you see, that’s where I think the confusion comes from…

From a comment from the blog:Furia fyape fkol serar lì’fyati awngeyä, leiu set nìlaw pxaya sute a oeto lu sìltsan!Which translates as ‘concerning how one is using our language, there are now clearly many people who are better than I’

2 lu: – one is used for ‘there are many people’ – one is used to complete the comparison ‘(they) are better than I’

What’s apparently confusing to some in my sentence (remember, relative free word order ) is that I chose to put the compared adjective at the end of the sentence afte the paradigm (that we all know): X to Y lu adj. = X is adj.-er than Y

Now, I see it like this (stripping the sentence of all additional information:

It took me a while but in the first post on the blog, there is this:Nìawnomum tolel oel ta ayhapxìtu lì’fyaolo’ä pxaya sìpawmit atxantsan a vay set ke ’oleyng. [1]And in the Txewì Listening exercise:Ulte Na’viru set lu nawma eyktan amip a larmu Tawtute. [2]And there are a lot of other examples with an attributative adjective with a following subordinate clause:Furia fìtute ahì’i a nemfa kifkey fpxìmäkìm… [3]… and there are probably others as well but I guess that’s enough to prove my point.

Irayo nìtxan ma Plumps

Obviously I have listened and read these examples many times, and I was still thinking that only one adjective or attributive clause is allowed from one side of the noun.Thank you for pointing this.

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